In an effort to keep the Daily Open Thread a little more open topic we are going to start a new daily thread for “Presidential Politics”. Please use this thread to post anything relating to the Donald Trump Administration and Presidency.

This thread will refresh daily and appear above the Open Discussion Thread.

Rex Tillerson said we are not pursuing a policy of regime change in Syria. After the obvious false flag gas attack the WH did not change that policy statement. They continued to focus on ISIS. I agree with SD. The seeming condemnation of violence in Syria and linkage to Assad was for the Jordanian press and our neoconservative so there is cover for peace plans to continue. Trump needs to position himself publically as “tough” to avoid the neo cons at FOX undermining him before he’s ready. Ditto for the King of Jordan. If he’d taken Assad and Russia’s side right now the public is not educated enough to understand why and it would feed the Putin Puppet narrative. Trump avoided that with a “meaningless” public statement that buys him time and positions him as not a feckless baby like Obama.

“This is information about their everyday lives,” Rep. Peter King of New York, a member of the House Intelligence committee said. “Sort of like in a divorce case where lawyers are hired, investigators are hired just to find out what the other person is doing from morning until night and then you try to piece it together later on.”

“…in 2015, NSA disseminated 4,290 FAA Section 702 intelligence reports that included U.S. person information. Of those 4,290 reports, the U.S. person information was masked in 3,168 reports and unmasked in 1,122 reports.”

The report said “NSA is allowed to unmask the identity for the specific requesting recipient only under certain conditions and where specific additional controls are in place” and those conditions were met for “654 U.S. person identities” in 2015.

One thing that I am happy about today: President Trump is an EXCELLENT judge of character. He is discerning and it comes completely naturally to him. He can smell a trap, a fake, or a traitor a mile away. He has successfully maneuvered around and through people and situations for decades. This is one of his very best qualities.

In light of recent events, I wonder if any of this garbage in Politico, WSJ, etc, is part of a continuing barium meal operation to flush out leakers. There are likely dozens, hopefully not more. I don’t trust anything that is reported anymore.

🚩Intelligence agencies were briefing Harry Reid about info found on people associated with the Trump Campaign.
Why would different US Intelligence agencies be briefing Harry Reid on members of the Trump Campaign. Harry Reid was briefed about Carter Page and Reid asked Comey to investigate Carter Page. As pointed out in an article in Politico dated Sept 2016.

♦️As for the FBI investigation, well, it’s unclear. A State Department official who works on Russia sanctions but was not authorized to speak on the record told me that, for one thing, there is “no prohibition meeting with a designated [sanctioned] individual. Moreover, sanctions violations are not criminal in nature and not enforced by the FBI. OFAC runs them.” He added, “the story doesn’t add up.” What does seem to have happened is that various U.S. intelligence agencies were looking into Page’s time in Moscow, then briefed Senate minority leader, Democrat Harry Reid, who wrote a letter to FBI Director James Comey asking him to investigate, among other things, “whether a Trump advisor who has been highly critical of U.S. and European economic sanctions on Russia, and who has conflicts of interest due to investments in Russian energy conglomerate Gazprom, met with high-ranking sanctioned individuals while in Moscow in July of 2016, well after Trump became the presumptive Republican nominee.”♦️

Anybody still watching senate vs Gorsuch? Chris Murphy D/CT just finished what a lying sack of shyt. Moaning on about how the republicans are changing the rules, Er no your guy Reid did that all on his own with every democrat fully in his corner. Suck it up cupcakes, YOUR chickens have come home to roost.
Obama’s legacy…the Democratic Party can now be called “The Party of Stompy Feet”

Senate Republicans are considering a unilateral change to Senate procedures that would limit the ability of the minority party to drag out debate on executive branch nominees once the Senate votes to end debate on those nominees, known as cloture.

Under the current process, voting for cloture on a nominee sets up 30 hours of post-cloture debate, then a confirmation vote. But Republicans are mulling whether to chop that down significantly, possibly as low as eight hours, in order to speed up the process of approving nominees.

The change is being considered this week, when the GOP Senate is also expected to change Senate precedent to allow cloture to be won with just a simple majority vote, instead of the current 60-vote threshold.

“With 1,200 people that have to go through the process, if every single one of them took eight hours, it would not be possible to run the calendar,” Lankford said. “So the minority still has leverage to be able to forge negotiations.”

One of McConnell’s spokesmen told the Washington Examiner there is “nothing to report” about the meeting beyond senators offering “lots of ideas” this week, but the majority leader’s colleagues believe he favors the idea.

Just over one hour ago I was standing in line at a store. A man was in front of me paying for his purchase, and he had his daughter with him. His daughter looked to be about eight years of age. The little girl told the cashier, without any coaxing, she just blurted it out……” if that mean Clinton lady had won president she would have taken away all of our guns and then try to hurt us “. The cashier said……” Your are right, that would have happened”. I told the father he was doing a very good job in educating his children about our Constitutional Rights.